Before the Grammy-winning Orpheus Chamber Orchestra performed in the lavish auditoriums of Carnegie Hall, it made a stop 60 miles west at none other than Lafayette College.
The chamber orchestra, with around 30 members, plays without a conductor and presented a program with Spanish flair last Friday. The ensemble has performed at Lafayette for over 40 years and typically plays at the college the night before playing at Carnegie.
Abi Fayette, a violinist in the orchestra and artistic director, said that Lafayette’s partnership with the orchestra is “one of our longest-standing run-out partners.”
A run-out concert is one that a group can travel to, play and be back to its intended destination, all in a day.
“Carnegie Hall is really amazing,” Fayette said. “But we also want to be able to take our programs elsewhere because we strive to create these really interesting, thoughtful programs, and it’s wonderful when we have the chance to share it with multiple audiences.”
Fayette described the Williams Arts Center as an “intimate hall” where guests are likely to be engaged with the music and performers.
Friday’s concert featured soloist Pablo Sáinz Villegas, an award-winning classical guitarist from Spain. He played Joaquin Rodrigo’s “Fantasía para un Gentilhombre,” a piece modeled off of Baroque dances.
He received a standing ovation and performed an encore, “Gran jota,” which features virtuosic techniques.
“One of the stunning moments in that piece is where the guitarist takes two of the bass strings and intertwines them so that they buzz like a snare drum,” said Jorge Torres, head of the music department. He said “Gran jota” is similar to a fandango, a lively Spanish dance.
“He really pulled together a bunch of unique techniques that you really don’t see,” Joshua Finn ‘25 said of Sainz Villegas after the concert. Finn is a violinist in Lafayette’s chamber orchestra.
Fayette described Sainz Villegas as “such a sensitive, collaborative musician.”
“He reacts so quickly to whatever the orchestra gives and he’s so clear about what he wants musically because of the really strong attentiveness of our orchestra,” Fayette said.
The final piece of Orpheus’ program, a 20-minute multi-movement work titled “Estampas Nocturnas,” by Manuel Ponce, was nothing like “any standard symphony orchestra concert,” according to Fayette. The violinist described it as more similar to a larger chamber work.
“The first movement starts off in a very dark place,” Fayette said. “It’s supposed to be representative of the night. There’s a lot of stuff that’s a little creepy and crawly about it. But then you have this very light and joyful, charming, gavotte movement.”
The final movement of Ponce’s piece is faster and intense, with “rich and color,” Fayette described.
“We’re lucky to have them because they’re a great ensemble, and we always had a great crowd coming to see them,” Torres said of the orchestra.
Guests at the packed Williams Arts Center ranged in age: some of them Lafayette students, others far older.
Nan Rice and Hal Rice, longtime attendees of Williams Arts Center concerts, attended their first Orpheus performance, as Hal Rice said he was “especially interested in the Cuban and the Mexican influence in the music.”
“We love to keep coming back here,” Nan Rice said.
